Sega cancels some stuff

[ClownTrousers]

To be fair, Alpha Protocol's story was entertaining enough, but everything encasing it was tripe.

Nonsense. Piff and pish to you.

[Venomous Albino]

It is rough around the edges, but the characters, choices, story branches, etc, were all brilliant. Approach it as a straight-up third person shooter and of course you won't enjoy it. Appreciate it as an RPG and it's sublime. Alpha Protocol would easily make it onto my top 5 underrated gems of this gen (if I had such a list).

[Johnny Shoulder]

Sounds like a poor man's Deus Ex....

[Havantgottaclue]

It is rough around the edges, but the characters, choices, story branches, etc, were all brilliant. Approach it as a straight-up third person shooter and of course you won't enjoy it. Appreciate it as an RPG and it's sublime. Alpha Protocol would easily make it onto my top 5 underrated gems of this gen (if I had such a list).

I agree with all of that. There were a couple of annoying bits (for example, Brayko was hellishly difficult) but I really enjoyed it for the most part.

[nojdanzig]

Sounds like a poor man's Deus Ex....

Yep but seeing as Deus Ex came out a long time after this then surely you must mean that Deus Ex is a polished version of Alpha Protocol.

You can get it for four quid now and thats a giant bucket of bargain flavoured goodness right there. And Deus Ex (which I enjoyed as much as AP) even seemed to ape its rock hard boss fights too.

[Venomous Albino]

I preferred AP over DE:HR to be honest. They share a few gameplay mechanics, but AP lacks DE:HR's pretentiousness and doesn't colour everything in with yellow crayon.

[The-Marb]

I preferred AP over DE:HR to be honest. They share a few gameplay mechanics, but AP lacks DE:HR's pretentiousness and doesn't colour everything in with yellow crayon.

I with VA on this one.

Technically DE was better but i enjoyed AP more.

[Eli Vance]

DE:HR's pretentiousness

Pretentious. In what way?



I loved Ap for what it did with linear design.

[Johnny Shoulder]

Sounds like a poor man's Deus Ex....

Yep but seeing as Deus Ex came out a long time after this then surely you must mean that Deus Ex is a polished version of Alpha Protocol.

So yeah like I said, a poor man's Deus Ex.

[Eli Vance]

@Nojdanzig. Deus Ex 1 came out in 2000 and Human Revolution has dumbed some of it down to better suit todays market. Tbh, I wouldn't even compare the two. Alpha Protocol is a linear game with chopped up levels and rpg elements added.

[The-Marb]

DE:HR came across as a bit linear too IMO. Most of the missions had to be undertaken at certain times. On the linearity scale (What would be the units? 'Rockstars'?) it sits somewhere between Mass Effect and a normal FPS i reckon.

Dont take this as me denigrating the technical quality of the game mind.

[Bob]

I think you're missing the point there marb.

The non-linearity came in the sheer number of ways you could achieve most objectives and that's what made it good.

Anyone who thinks it wasn't a magical game probably didn't replay it or just approached it as a straight up shooter.

The sandbox was more involved and cleverer than being just an open world.. which surely isn't enough to be good anymore..

[Johnny Shoulder]

Agree with Bob.

From what I can remember, both Marb & VA marked Deus Ex down for:

1. Not being any good at the hacking mini game.

2. Not being Mass Effect.

Hardly fair I think.

[The-Marb]

Half right JS.
My major gripe was how uninvolving the story and characters were and it's crap boss battles.

I can deal with it not being ME and I'm sure I admitted at some point that the hacking thing was my fault.
I certainly didn't try and play it like a straight shooter.

Despite my mostly positive review, I just didnt fellate it like a enthusiastic hooker, like some on here. Anyone woulda thunk I gave it a 1/10.

You guys are so rabidly defending the game that you missed the compliment I gave it. I.e. How's it's technically vastly superior to AP. I just enjoyed AP more despite it's slight shonkiness. This is purely on how involved it got me, and my ability to pick my own choices.

[Eli Vance]

DE:HR came across as a bit linear too IMO. Most of the missions had to be undertaken at certain times. On the linearity scale (What would be the units? 'Rockstars'?) it sits somewhere between Mass Effect and a normal FPS i reckon.

Alpha Protocol is linear game design chopped up to suit branching narrative. I mean, the only difference between Ap and a standard linear game comes from not having to do the middle levels in a set order. With standard linear games you have to do level 2 after level 1 and so on. Ap doesn't really stray that far though as the player only has a choice on the order of 3 levels out of 5. Think of what Hr would be like if the opening and last levels were the only ones set. Ap's missions are linear leaving little room for deviation or changes in approach.

Both games use hub and spoke design, spokes being the main mission levels. If Hr's hub were the same as Ap's though it would only amount to the player being able to explore Jensens apartment. Leaving nothing of the outside world for the player to learn about, explore or influence in anyway.

Like I said earlier a lot of the originals design was dumbed down and fps elements hugely increased for Hr. Eidos should've stuck more closely to the originals design instead of trying to suit todays market, imo.

I'm not knocking your opinion nor do I think you see Hr as a bad game. As I said in the other thread I get how you like stories to come across so I can understand why Ap appeals to you more.